


so often returning to the same place

by bansheesquad (deathwailart)



Category: Original Work
Genre: Banshees, F/M, Necromancy, Scottish Character, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-17
Updated: 2019-10-17
Packaged: 2020-12-21 06:27:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21070382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathwailart/pseuds/bansheesquad
Summary: Set in a Glasgow where there were two kinds of resurrection men in the days of yesteryear; where necromancers and the death omens work alongside each other to make sure things are carried out according to the rules regarding the bones that have lived in the city for hundreds of years.





	so often returning to the same place

If the stories weren't so well-known as Edinburgh then that was how those things went; no one was bitter about it after all but Edinburgh was funny anyway, and the uni had more English up there than was right. Not that it was saying much, tuition fees and all had seen a load of them creeping up from the South, but Edinburgh had _always_ been like that. Had never been the beating heart same as Glasgow. Glasgow had sent ships all across the world and that lingered, iron under the tongue, sweet rot carried in the air.  
  
Edinburgh had Greyfriars and a wee dug. Glasgow had not one necropolis but two.  
  
And if Glasgow had Burke and Hare, their grim legacy, seventeen tiny coffins up Arthur's Seat then there was College Street. Edinburgh had never been alone in resurrection men after all, only more famous about it in a ghoulish way, the rivalry amongst universities that still flourished today. (Shirley liked to think that Glasgow was better but of course she was at the art school, her brother up at the University doing engineering along with her boyfriend.) It had always struck her as, if not a pity, then still a little shameful that Blackfriars or Ramshorn weren't nearly as well-known as elsewhere. After all they'd had the founder of the first College Street medical school banned from teaching because of bodysnatching. And, in her opinion, one of the most notorious bodysnatching incidents had taken place in Glasgow. Not that most knew of it.  
  
But that was by the by: dodging tourists because who else'd be daft enough to be taking photos of Wellington astride Copenhagen in early October drizzle in the fading light? Shirley tucked her face deeper into her scarf, hot breath on her cheeks and stamped her feet. Above her Copenhagen seemed to be champing at the bit, and well, she knew how the beast felt as she checked her phone for something a bit more substantial than yet another _on my way_ or _bloody ScotRail_ update from Blair. He was the one who wanted to come see in the first place, saying that he was ready to take the final leap now, more than ready for it. And perhaps he was a little puffed up after his successful trip to the anatomy museum with her which had been just to gauge what he could handle, so this would be a test. The final one maybe of how deep a plunge he was willing to take into her world. There wouldn't be boundary lines after this, she'd be doing more than letting him wander along them, he'd be immersed as fully as he could be.  
  
Not that they were boundary lines, in truth. Fault lines was closer to the truth when it came to the murky memories every soul brought with them.  
  
Shirley huffed a breath through her nose, fancying she could see steam rising from Copenhagen's nostrils. It wouldn't be the first time. Phone in hand she dialled. Waited. Waited. _Waited_. A bus rattled past in the time it took for his voicemail to pick up, windows clouded with condensation, the faint light inside it eerie in the gathering dark.   
  
"I'm away under the Hielanman's Umbrella, meet me there, it's bloody Baltic, I'm not waiting out here."  
  
(No, it wasn't, a good month shy of a real cold snap coming but let Blair shoulder than guilt when he was late to the thing he'd been so gung-ho about. _Her_ thing at that.)  
  
Skliffing her way down the street through the crowds doing late night shopping, she tucked her hands in her pockets. One around her phone so she couldn't be accused of missing him if he _did_ ring her back because he might try that one. That was unfair of her, the lingering dregs from her migraine turning her crabbit now after a long day in classes and if he was stuck on the train then that wasn't entirely his fault but she was still annoyed with him, rubbing the side of her jaw that throbbed from where she'd held it tight from the pain. At least it had passed and she hadn't had to go home from it, but it wasn't fair, she'd been whinging about it on and off, and now, tonight, in the dreich weather she just wanted things to go her way. Petty as it might be.  
  
Sometimes you needed to be a little petty about things.  
  
Her phone buzzed in her pocket but it wasn't Blair, just her brother checking in, with a series of ghosts and skulls and an aubergine that she frowned at, typing back furiously with frozen fingers as soon as she was under some shelter, ducking behind a few goths decked out as they always were. No matter how long she lived out here she'd never understand why they hung out about here no matter the weather – unless she'd missed some memo about their love of McDonald's - because they were _always_ clustered down in the corner, damp and bedraggled but one had an umbrella done up like a parasol and Shirley stopped her just to say she liked it, getting herself a black-lipped smile which eased some of the tightness lingering at the back of her head.  
  
They were usually good, the goth lot, and she'd never quite been brave enough to go about exactly how she'd wanted at their age.  
  
Then again, she supposed she'd had plenty going on. It hadn't been your average teenage years in the McAllister household.  
  
Sighing, she texted Blair again, waiting for his apology as she tucked her dark hair under her hood, listening to the traffic as she leant back against the wall, watching the world go by until he showed up.  
  


* * *

  
  
A solid half hour after they'd agreed upon and Blair finally showed up; he had the grace to blush when she stared him down, but he'd brought coffee as a gesture of contrition even if that had held up a little longer. He was out of breath too, panting as he held them out to her, not quite going for the kiss he usually offered her with the splashes up the legs of his jeans to prove that he'd run all the way. It was freezing, rain spraying up off the road as cars pelted along, a few delivery bikes weaving in and out perilously and she took the cup from him gratefully even as her fingers stung at the sudden heat of it. She caught his chin, stubble growing out again, planting a kiss, a brush of frozen noses against each other.  
  
He smiled, still embarrassed but sensing forgiveness had come his way and he wasn't a man about to question it.  
  
"We headed then?" He asked, inhaling the steam from the coffee as he squinted as her, sight that they both were with hoods drawn up against a steady onslaught, shoulders hunched against the cold.  
  
"Yep, c'mon, we're running late." She marched along ahead of him, not that she needed to but it meant he got splashed and he deserved it. Just a little. It didn't take much for Blair to catch up to her with those long legs.  
  
"How's that matter? If anything I'm keeping with the spirit of our endeavour if we show up in the cover of darkness! Isn't that how they did it in those days? Besides, we're up at the Necropolis, not Ramshorn or anywhere else, they didn't go looting there." Blair hesitated, waiting for her little nod of confirmation. "See? Hours of darkness, waiting, that was the whole thing. Between you and Euan I've been filling in some blanks."  
  
She swung a foot at him lazily, doing little more than startling a pigeon that took off in a noisy clap of wings inches from his face. She'd take it. "They had schedules to be respected for obvious reason; you can't just go doing any of this willy-nilly, can you?"  
  
"I don't know, that's why I'm here to find out. You're the expert." He bumped her, just a little nudge, and despite herself she smiled up at him then screwed up her face when he grinned back, that big stupid one she wanted to hate more, that 'the sun smiles out your arse' grin her dad gave her mum that she tried not to examine too often.  
  
"I'm not." God she didn't want to say that to him when he'd kept her hanging about as long as he had on a night like this but you couldn't enter into what they were about to undertake on a lie. "When we get there you'll see. I know what I'm about but there's a reason it's still an apprenticeship."  
  
Or close enough. She liked to call it an apprenticeship. Her mum called it that, her dad…he was more a spectator, same as her brother. They went along with what they were told.   
  
"And they're fine wi' you bringing folk back?" He sounded as dubious as he had the first time it had come up but she didn't hold that against him. "I mean all of us lot've seen how my boss gets when everyone crowds in even though you'd think he'd be happy for—"  
  
She cut him off before he could build up a head of steam on that familiar argument. "It's fine. I cleared it all up, if we did visitors badges you'd have one," as she spoke she steered him under the bus stop between a few pensioners in waterproof jackets and a guy in trackies with a baby whacking the clear plastic cover of their buggy, another child of some description who looked as if a fancy dress shop had vomited them out in tow, splashing with abandon in the puddle a crack in the pavement had formed. "It's a different apprenticeship, like…" The child distracted her, wheeling about merrily faster and faster until the dad – or whoever was taking the hit, you didn't just assume – hauled them back despite their high-pitched protests, the baby hammering out an ever-faster tattoo.  
  
She came back to herself. Too loud. Too many colours. They even had those light-up trainers, she'd had the same when she'd been little too and she smiled at the man when she was caught staring, a tired tight smile and a nod given in return.  
  
Blair coughed, getting her attention again and she continued where she'd left off. "It's more a part-time job but learning old traditions so they don't get lost and forgotten, look, you'll see when we get there, it's not long. That's our bus."  
  
"Just amazed you're out doing that Miss—"  
  
"Oh don't start. Here, hold this." She shoved her coffee at him, digging her purse out her bag as she waved for the bus as it drew in. "Seeing as you got coffee."  
  
"Cheers doll." He cut a glance at her though as she paid their fare, still not quite confident enough to say it without checking her reaction as he found them seats.  
  
"You're terrible," she complained, squishing in next to him, closer than she needed to be in all honesty but he was still holding her coffee, waiting for her to get her hood down and her scarf away from her face. "And really, thank you for the coffee."  
  
"Well you said you'd had a migraine or the start of one, thought this'd help a bit." His cheeks were pink when she tugged his hood back for him, tucking herself close as she took her coffee; it wasn't a long bus to the necropolis and on a better night they'd have walked the length of it but she fancied sparing herself when the vision had gone out her eyes once already today. "You doing better?"  
  
"The new stuff from the doctor seems to be starting to work, I mean it's still shit getting the full thing in half an hour but another half hour again and it's gone. It'll never be perfect but I'll take that over what I had before." She sipped the coffee, resisting the urge to lean her head on his shoulder. She'd be soaked if she did. "I don't need to go home if I get one, I can stay in class, keep doing what I need to be doing."  
  
"You barely went home even when you needed to. I still have some of those texts you'd tried to send," Blair took a sip, looking over at her. "One of us would come meet you to see you got home safe. Didn't want to stick you on a bus when you couldn't spell."  
  
"I'm not going to almost drop out of art school because of _migraines_ Blair."  
  
Blair smiled at her, mouth tight, and she reached for his hand to give it a squeeze. He was a good one as her grandpa would say which he didn't tend to say too often about anyone younger than forty and especially not about anyone she'd spent much time with because that was the privilege of old Irish grandpas who had long memories and didn't trust a single bastard walking the earth but he'd taken to Blair in the end, and he _was_ good. So she said nothing else, hunkering down into his side to let the coffee do its work, both of them finishing and tossing them in the awkward bin right at their stop as they hopped out into the cold that had slackened off into a drizzle to finish the walk to the Necropolis gates. Shirley was the one to take Blair's hand, giving it a squeeze before she swung their arms back and forth like a couple of children up to the gates, Blair huffing out a laugh as he fell in step with her.  
  


* * *

  
  
"How come," Blair asked as they made their way into the Necropolis through the elaborate main gates of wrought iron painted black and gold opening to Shirley, Blair's arm tucked in hers in the dark, "you've everything under the sun in that bag but no brolly?"  
  
"I refuse to ruin myself buying them, it's too windy here." Shirley led him along, mouthed _toties reduentes eodum_ as she always did because it comforted her to do so; the path was familiar to her, a thing that tugged her the right way even when she couldn't see her hand in front of her face. "I come meet you and my brother enough times to see that bin outside the—what building is it again?"  
  
"The Boyd Orr."  
  
"Blair?"  
  
"Mhm?"  
  
"Why're you whispering? I can hardly hear you in all this." It was pointless to gesture since he probably couldn't see it but Shirley did it anyway. Just enough to hit him – lightly – in the chest as she did so. A grand sweeping thing that would've gone better if the weather had lent itself to not being in a jacket to allow her scarf to float about her arms as she did so but so be it.   
  
"We're in—it's full of dead folk. I'm trying to be respectful." He bent a little – Blair had the better part of a foot on her as things stood and her boots didn't add much to bridge the gap – so he was a bit easier to hear.  
  
She drew them to a halt, stepping in front of him with a smile on her face that she tried to hide. She didn't want to embarrass him, sweet as it was to hear it from him, even if she did want to see him get squeamish because there was something a little bit endearing about to her even if he didn't always see it that way. "Blair. Be honest: do you have the fear?"  
  
"Away and gie yoursel' peace," he muttered, eyes darting about and with his hand still on her arm. He'd tugged her closer, she wondered if he'd noticed that.   
  
"Sweetheart," she said, a hand on his coat, "that wasn't an answer." She wanted to kiss him but if he was lowering his voice to be respectful of those long buried or remembered here then she was certain he'd object to that, he'd probably be scandalised and say that _they_ were scandalising them too, that the dead would come for their youth.  
  
Some of them might but not here. Not these sort of dead. They'd been away too long for all that.   
  
Still, it was endearing, and his face, gone pale, mouth twisting, how he'd even gone pigeon-toed? He had absolutely no right to look that way at all yet here they both were.   
  
"I'm—look. It's one thing in the day and another thing at night. The anatomy museum was weird because 'oh that's bits of people who were alive in _chunks_' y'know?" He took a shaky breath and she nodded, getting an arm round him to rub his back, hand tucked up her sleeve so she wouldn't get it soaked. "And it's…I know it's stupid. It's bones. Less than bones. No one's seeing me except maybe they are? I don't know."  
  
"It's fine to be scared, it's normal." She took his hand, tugged him along behind her until he caught up and put an arm round her instead. "I just need to know."  
  
"Your brother might've…" He faltered. She knew he'd be chewing his lap if she looked up at him.  
  
"Euan might've _what_?" She asked flatly, knowing that the bugger'd be off in the flat giggling right now or wondering when he should text to have Blair jumping out his skin. Was that why he'd texted her in the first place? Whatever, she'd get him back later.  
  
"Nothing, he just told me that vampire story again and when it's your family telling those stories? There's a little more weight to them, that's all."  
  
"Fair. More than fair. And there's some truth to that but not tonight. Or not now." Euan was definitely getting it in the neck if _that_ was the story he'd sent Blair off with, the fucker, but for now, she caught sight of where she'd been looking for and drew to a halt. "Right we're here!"  
  
"Where's here?"  
  
There were two answers to Blair's question: here was, in fact, the Egyptian vaults where once they had stored bodies while the grand sepulchres were still being built if they'd died suddenly, cast iron gates with inverted torches and a winged hourglass above them on the stone itself. She could taste the iron in the back of her throat but there were reasons for it and the door would be open, just enough for her to slip through without touching. That was always the case.  
  
The way wasn't barred for her, not tonight.  
  
Still, Blair could get that answer from a tour guide or going on his phone, not from coming here with her tonight and he was waiting expectantly for her answer, rocking back and forward, heel to toe, heel to toe.  
  
"We're where you're going to see something that you said you wanted to see that's not on the tours, that's just whispers about the place, and you're in the rare position to know someone who happens to be part of it all. Now, there aren't too many rules since you're with me, but just…be respectful? And—" She opened her bag again, rifling through a pocket to come out with a pin that she fastened to his coat, testing that it was good and secure.   
  
"I thought you said there weren't visitors badges?" Blair sounded like he was joking, or close enough. It pitched up too high at the end for it to land and this time she did go up on her toes to kiss the corner of his mouth.  
  
"It's not. It's for safety." More than anything Shirley wished it didn't sound like an apology but some things couldn’t be helped; what wonders she had to be doing for alleviating his fears right about now. "Just…no, I can't, it's such a cow thing to say, I won't—"  
  
"No, go on, say it."  
  
"Do you trust me?" Her heart pounded as she asked and she was sure that if it wasn't for the cold, her hands would be sweating as she touched the little gold pin again, just to be sure. To be absolutely certain it wouldn't come loose.   
  
"I'm here, aren't I?"  
  
"That's not—"  
  
He smiled, his turn to tip her chin up to kiss her, something short and chaste, little more than a brush of lips. "Were you going to say 'that's not an answer'?" He asked, teasing as she gave him a little shove because he was being a shit but at least he was feeling brave enough for it. "Yes, I trust you. I'm here because I trust you, but I want to know what's going on with the pin if I get to know that. Is it real gold?"  
  
"Yes it's real gold. Gold drives off the dullahan. Just in case the one who rattles about here takes exception to you being here."  
  
"Right. Course. The dullahan." He took a breath in through his nose and back out, looking from her to over her shoulder. "Are we keeping your gaffer waiting?"  
  
She turned, nodding to the figure lingering just inside and linked fingers with Blair. "The dead are patient, it's the living that're in a rush but if you're ready, we'll go."  
  
"Lead the way." Sounding braver than he looked, Blair nodded to her and Shirley turned towards the column, Blair a step behind her, hand securely clutched in hers, squeezing just shy of painful as they stepped past and through.  
  


* * *

  
  
"You're all right, you're all right," Shirley soothed as Blair came back to her, his head between his knees, heaving and retching with nothing coming up. Her mum had warned her about this. About how her dad had almost fainted and cracked his head open when he'd come along with her that first time but even so, she hovered, crouched next to him with her hand rubbing circles on his back as he groaned.  
  
"Christ did a bus hit me?"  
  
"No, sorry, you're…here and not here. It's a between place. Liminal. We'll do that explanation after too. Can you stand yet?"   
  
"Can I get a hand?"  
  
"Yeah, c'mon, up we get." She stood, hauling him up as she did and he staggered for a few moments, Bambi on ice, a hand braced on her shoulder with his eyes screwed shut. "Sweetheart," she said it gently, aware of the third figure in the room with them who hadn't said anything yet but remained, watching this, Blair letting out another groan as he found his legs.  
  
"Right, I'm—it's passed. I'm good. Got it."  
  
"Okay. Welcome to…welcome to the other place I work. This is Farquhar."  
  
Shirley stepped to the side, still with her arm around Blair in case he needed it to unveil the man Blair had referred to as her gaffer when they'd set out and, if she had to put a name to it, then it was good enough though strictly speaking not quite right. Blair made a noise in the back of his throat, not alarmed but surprised.  
  
She supposed that everyone had an idea when it came to necromancers fed by their imaginations and Farquhar, bless him, honestly looked like he belonged on a farm. A nice farm. The sort you saw on Countryfile where it never rained the way it did around here, all rolling green fields, Highland cows, the funny black-faced sheep with the black knees. Wee flat cap, wax coat, sensible shoes, his greying hair neatly parted; he put Shirley in mind of lecturers or better yet, a geography teacher, not a man who'd had involvement with the dead and spirits for decades now as he held out a hand to Blair. Then again there was her family, wasn't there? Who would look at them and decide that any of them were what they were?  
  
"A pleasure to meet you young man, I've heard only the very best from Miss McAllister here, Farquhar Urquhart; have you been advised of what awaits this evening?" He smiled, the kindly smile of the grandpa who offered you Werther's Originals, a few mild little indiscretions and hijinks kept from your mother and father with a twinkle in the eye and a finger tapped against the side of his nose.  
  
Blair looked between them both as he let go of Farquhar's hand, mouth working. "Ehm…sorry, where're my manners, Blair Lawson, lovely to meet you, and yes, I've heard a bit? Shirley's…I mean I know. But…sorry my brain's totally gone."  
  
"Not to worry son, not to worry, if you'll come with me. Have you a light Miss McAllister?"   
  
In all the time she'd known him from when she'd been peeking out behind her mum's legs along with her granny, Shirley had always been Miss McAllister. Probably Farquhar's way of making her part of things like a proper grown-up though she'd never asked and even now when she _was_a grown-up in her own right with her share of the duties split three ways between her family, the nickname had stuck and she was loathe to be parted from it.   
  
So with a smile, nudging Blair to get him moving, she took out a torch, passing it to Blair with another one in hand. "Absolutely. Blair asked to come here to see what it is I do – he knows what I am. Who I am. But you and I know there are gulfs between knowing and _knowing_."  
  
"Of course though this – no, we put that language argument to bed didn't we? Now, Mister Lawson—"  
  
"Blair, please—"  
  
"Right you are son," Farquhar's voice echoed off the stone as they walked through a cold dark space, the lights of the torch illuminating their path as Blair reached a hand back to Shirley who took it. "Now I can tell you the history of the Necropolis if you'd like, it's a passion of mine, any of the cemeteries of this dear green place are, the stories they can tell, it's a crying shame they're overlooked, the state of disrepair they're in these days."  
  
"Do you do tours elsewhere?" Blair asked, almost losing his footing as the path pitched down.  
  
"Mind yourself, we're at the stairs," Shirley whispered, trying to apologise but not wanting to interrupt Farquhar.  
  
"Should there be stairs here?" Blair asked, sotto voce.  
  
"We're here and not here," she replied. Gently. Ever so gently. Blair nodded and followed on, Farquhar being good enough to give them that moment before picking up as if he'd never left off.   
  
"Sorry son should've warned you about those. And I do, I take turns here. I used to teach history before I retired and it keeps the mind sharp, gets me out and about meeting folk instead of being stuck in the house. Dangerous when you're getting on in years you mark my words." Farquhar turned to smile at them both and Shirley was glad to see that Blair was smiling too, that he didn't seem too nervous to be here in a space that shouldn't, by all rights, exist, listening to an old man talk away at him leading him to parts unknown.  
  
("He's a good one," her gran had told her a while back when they'd been closing up the pub, wiping down tables, gathering up empty glasses. Shirley had agreed then, agreed more strongly now.)  
  
"Now the Necropolis we find ourselves by tonight was initiated by the Merchants' House in eighteen thirty-two, glorious Victorian theatre of styles, you need to come in the light of day to better appreciate it: Classical, Baroque, Norman, Gothic, Renaissance, Moorish, Celtic, Art Noveau – truly a gorgeous sight. Not the oldest of our graveyards but many got built over, it's how it goes. We've many old bones here."  
  
"I don't think we're in the Necropolis anymore though, are we?" Blair asked as Farquhar went for the keys in his pocket, a stupidly large ring of the things that rattled away as he flicked through them for the right one to open a door that mercifully didn't squeak or groan the way it should; Shirley didn't know if Blair's nerves could stand that though he was doing better than expected even if he was swapping hands with the torch so he could wipe one then the other on his trousers.  
  
"We'll call it liminal space and leave it at that, all of us have our own definitions of it and you spend enough time round this one and you'll come up with your own."  
  
"It's not fairy rings," Shirley said because that had been—well it had been a thing for a while. And Blair hadn't wanted to come to dinner for a while. Had experienced a few weeks of blind panics, texts at odd hours that she'd tried to judge the seriousness of before he'd be telling her to ignore them, he was just being daft but she hadn't. He was past that now but still. Reminders needed to be repeated sometimes. "There aren't rules to trick or trap you and if you walked back the way you came you'd be out the way you came in and free to go."  
  
"Free to go out in the pishing rain in the middle of the night in a Glasgow graveyard."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Okay. Just checking. Sorry go ahead."  
  
Farquhar smiled at them both with a little shake of the head as he beckoned them in to a room that did and didn't exist to all and sundry in Glasgow as Shirley took over proceedings because Farquhar had talked enough already, and some parts of death were her jurisdiction. Or that was her opinion on the matter and she was right as far as she was concerned.   
  
"We've always had resurrection men in Glasgow. Medical students needed corpses and there were…different methods of getting them depending on the stories you've heard; either they were robbing graves or there was someone with a side hustle going on with paupers where the paupers weren't buried in the first place if there weren't mourners and everyone got a slice of the profit. Now," Shirley's footsteps echoed as she approached the slab where skeletons had been laid out for coming up on two centuries now, walking a circle around it as Farquhar closed the door behind them and lit the trusty lanterns, the smell of paraffin tickling her nose. "At the same time, there's always been the other side. Death omens, psychopomps, all the terrible lurking things that we all tell tall tales about.  
  
"My mum's side came over back during the famine, brought over all their beliefs with them; it's why Glasgow is what it is. How it is. And you know it's not as if the saints here are any less mental when you go digging into some of the things people have put down by their names. Along with the resurrection men though you had the real ones. Not the folk interested in Galvanism but the ones who cared about the bones."  
  
"It caused rather the upset and the stir all that grave robbing business so it did," Farquhar added, as if he was discussing the current state of the transfer season or something equally mild, setting a lantern down on the stone slab to reveal the bones neatly laid out.  
  
Blair swore, lurching back and away, crossing himself then freezing. "Is that—that's real but I don't—Jesus that's a person."  
  
"You saw corpses in the anatomy museum." Shirley pointed it out patiently because they'd built up to this after all.  
  
"That's different!"  
  
"It is," she agreed, unable to stop herself from rolling her eyes. "They've still got their meat and their skin but it's all been preserved."  
  
Blair took another series of deep breaths, hands on his knees, bent down so his head was between them and this time Farquhar patted his back. "You're all right son, you're with friends, we'll see you through this."  
  
"This is where bones are meant to be. They had catacombs built by the entrance façade, there was a whole tunnel planned to go right through the hill but it's just where the lawnmowers live now."  
  
"Security from body snatchers but they passed the Anatomy Act the same year the initiated the Necropolis so that put paid to it. Nobody wanted to be buried in it."  
  
"I might've."  
  
"Well weren't not all you Miss McAllister."  
  
That got a laugh out of Blair who came close to get a better look at the bones, groping the empty air for Shirley's hand, his fingers clammy.   
  
"There have always been two sorts of resurrection men. Those who disappeared with the time and those that you'd call necromancers. Like myself." Farquhar's smile was nothing short of bashful as he took off his coat, setting it down on the floor; Shirley had to bite her lip because of course he was in a sensible shirt with a knitted vest on, the last man you'd accuse of raising the dead in any capacity. "We've rules for these things and those have gone back longer than graveyards of course but it was around that time that we did have to bring in tighter rules so none of us would be caught up in things. Which is why we work with those tied to death, as is only right."  
  
"We've got the connection to the beyond and to the next of kin, there's no one better at knowing how to handle all this business. And better us than a dullahan. Fine for us to deal with them but less so the living even if you've got some gold on you," Shirley explained as she tugged Blair forward with her so they were opposite Farquhar.  
  
"Now the rules are that unlike the anatomists of yesteryear we cannot raise the dead if they've flesh on the bones, it's for sanitary purposes mostly."  
  
"Yeah I manage it'd be manky to have them going around…wait can I interrupt and just ask something that'll bug me if I don't?"  
  
"Fire away."  
  
"If you did raise something that had flesh on it would it stay as it is or would it be rotting or…"  
  
"It'd stay as it was but depending on condition upon death, how the body was prepared...that's a large factor in it especially coming from the past where we didn't have those methods."  
  
Blair puffed out his cheeks, nodding. "Okay then. I'm good to keep going."  
  
"There's a fine in place for anyone who breaks those conditions, it depends upon their own financial situation, but we do have to have penalties for such a serious violation of the rules as well as desecration of the dead."  
  
"People can also leave their bodies to us, usually it's communicated by going through the proper channels – you find a lawyer in the know or it'll get to us in the will or via the spirit," Shirley took over as Farquhar raised his hands, running them over the bones without touching them and she wondered if Blair felt it, flow of life and death being disturbed, rippling outwards from the skeleton. "It's their choice to donate but sometimes when someone like me goes to announce a death it's there. You just—you know. All coiled up there and with it, with those last moments of the grief you take from their loved ones."  
  
"And if they don't know?" Blair's voice had dropped again, maybe so he wouldn't disturb Farquhar as they moved back as one to not get in the way of him circling the bones, hands still outstretched but never touching.  
  
"There's a grace period of over a hundred years then you can raise them. If they've living next of kin you need to get their permission so again, that's where I come in because I'm that intermediary where I can connect the living and the dead better and go chat to them. And chat to the spirit better and say 'hi your great-great-great auntie Muriel, d'you mind if we go using her bones now her spirit's in another place?"  
  
"Do folk go for that?"  
  
"Most of the time they're baffled by it but you explain it to them and that person doesn't need their bones anymore, and no one'll do anything disrespectful with them. They've got to look after whoever they've raised."  
  
"Really?"  
  
"Of course, why wouldn't they? You'd be overrun with bones and they'd get ruined and we'd lose so much if that wasn't part of it so you have to keep them clean and unbroken, if they start getting too much wear and tear – they're bones, it'll happen eventually it's the same as with the elderly or if you've got joint problems – then you have to lay them to rest again where you found them with respect. If you don't? Hefty fine."  
  
There was a crunching noise, a rattle, Farquhar clearing his throat with a little cough and any further questions would have to wait: the bones were rising up, sitting, both hands scrabbling over the stone, Shirley grabbing for Blair when he staggered heavily into her with a quiet curse.  
  
"Welcome back, oh welcome back, we are so glad to see you again," Farquhar greeted, almost tearful as he hurried to drape his coat over the bare shoulders when the hands reached about to cover ribs, head swivelling. "I'm Farquhar Urquhart who raised you and will keep you as we spoke of before."  
  
"I'm Shirley McAllister, I was the one to speak to you first from the other side: it would have been my people who announced your passing to your loved ones. This is—"  
  
"I'm Blair Lawson," he interrupted, voice shaking but he was trying, bless him, "I'm…I'm happy to be a part of this and to see you back."  
  
The head inclined in a nod, turning to swing their legs off the side.  
  
"I see that this is well done and in accordance with the rules set down by those who came before us all. As witnessed by Shirley McAllister, banshee of Elspeth McAlvennie and Iona McAllister's bloodline."  
  
"As so witnessed by Shirley McAllister, I Farquhar Urquhart swear to follow our laws and to keep these bones well until I lay them to their final rest."  
  
Shirley nodded to him and took a bony hand in hers for a moment, smiling into sockets that glowed with the light and life that had been gifted to them. "May we meet each other again my friend." She turned to Blair and gave him a little tug towards the door. "C'mon, time to take you home."  
  


* * *

  
  
Her brother had made himself scarce by the time she got Blair back to the flat, maybe off getting a free dinner from their parents or out with some of his terrible friends drinking cheap shitty beer. Shirley didn't care. She had peace to get her and Blair out of their wet coats and boots, to settle Blair in a seat in the tiny excuse the flat called a kitchen and scrounge up two clean mugs. Astonishingly there was more than a sad scant inch of milk left in the bottle on the fridge door so someone had clearly gone shopping. They might tease her about her own flat share situation but there was always food in the fridge and it was presentable at all times in case parents or the landlord showed up without someone having to panic and run round the place with a hoover and binbag like they were on the worst version of supermarket sweep.  
  
"So…" She made a face filling the kettle when her hand came away sticky. "Do you two clean this kitchen?"  
  
"I do when I can't stand it but the rota is I clean the toilet. I'm not showering his filth." He stopped with a shudder and she didn't know if it was exaggerated or not.  
  
"God give me strength. Anyway, now you know. Or know more than you did. And I don't really know what to say to you now."  
  
"You don't take all the boys off to the graveyard with you?"  
  
"Only the special ones, the real good ones." She clicked the kettle on and turned, relieved to see that Blair was smiling at her and she took a seat across from him at the table, reaching for his outstretched hands. "You know bits and pieces about my family. About other places and boundaries and things that aren't necessarily _normal_ to most folk."  
  
"Yeah. Yeah I do. Lot of history with your family."  
  
"Euan brought up the vampire story to scare you," it was a tangent to bring it up but she had to, had to veer a little off-track to let them both know where they were going, "and I said I'd tell you properly. That one's from the Southern Necropolis in the Gorbals; years ago a whole gang of kids showed up there, said there was a vampire who'd killed two of them, that they were going to do him in."  
  
"Euan told me they said he had iron teeth. And that he'd killed and eaten two boys," Blair interrupted as Shirley rose at the kettle boiling, the noise covering her sigh at her brother's antics. Euan and Blair had been pals longer than Shirley and Blair had been an item but that didn't stop her brother from pulling his leg. Sometimes it made him worse about it when the two of them were off 'doing lovey-dovey' things.   
  
"It was seven feet tall," she continued as she waited for the tea to steep, pouring milk in their cups with her back to him.  
  
"So the stories say?"  
  
"No." Shirley hesitated only for a second. Blair had had the veil lifted now, hadn't he? Might as well get the whole truth. "No he was…he was real."  
  
"And a whole mob of kids from the Gorbals rocked up back in the fifties with stakes and knives, even dogs? That happened. I mean, he showed me the articles on his phone so I know that did but you're both saying that there was something more to it and I saw—I mean I saw what I saw tonight. So I don't know what's going on now."  
  
"It happened for a few nights, polis got involved, they kept going back looking for this vampire. I'm guessing Euan showed you something about oh there was a bit in the Bible or some comic they read or whatever that was," she poured the tea, sliding Blair's over as she took a seat, tossing her hair over her shoulder as she held her mug tight in both hands, the warmth comforting. "But there was a ghost. There was a ghost and her name was Jenny wi' the Iron Teeth, she's in an old poem by Alexander Anderson."  
  
"Can I jump in and guess that he was bang on the money about auld Jenny?" Blair went to take a sip of his tea then thought better of it, setting it down heavily enough that it nearly sloshed over the rim of the mug.  
  
"Something went a bit wrong with Jenny. You know the whole 'clap your hands if you believe' thing?"  
  
"Isn't that a bit offensive? I mean you're…sort of one of them. Not Disneyfied but…" Blair trailed off, bringing a hand up to his mouth to chew at his thumb until Shirley caught it and brought it back down; it had been a while since he'd done that, back during exams and her stomach twisted.  
  
"We're not talking about me, specifically, just that concept. It matters. Sorry this is all confusing to try to catch someone up with it, you should come to dinner with all of us, dad and grandpa'd be better for this they were on your side of it once, I wasn't. Anyway," she risked a sip of her tea, still just a little hot for her liking but not so hot that she'd scalded her mouth, "Jenny is a woman in the poem who is begged by tired and irritated parents to take their children. It's grim stuff, I won't lie, so say you've a bunch of kids who've heard all that and have it in their minds. And they've got some comic books in mind. Now enter into it what happened up at the Necropolis and say, someone wasn't doing things right. Bending the rules a bit. You've got all the right elements for things to go sideways."  
  
Blair sipped his tea, saying nothing for several minutes as the tap dripped, the downstairs neighbours banging their door open noisily below, laughing and shouting. "But all the different versions are true in their own way?"  
  
"The best I've been able to find out is that someone pieced together someone to look after children and didn't do a good job of it, either some slapdash job or they were doing deliberate experiments off the books and got caught in a big way: when it hits the news like that, we're all in trouble. My gran might remember it better. Or dad's parents but they don't know the whole of it so y'know, not much point in asking them."  
  
"Jesus." Blair dropped his head into his hands with a groan that gave way to a huffing laugh. "So why did I get asked if you don't take all the boys and it's not meant to be spread around?"  
  
"Maybe I think you're for keeps."  
  
"That so?" He propped his chin up on his hand and even peely-wally from cold and shock, his hair curling falling out of that little pompadour-quiff thing he liked after the weather and being in and out of a hood, it was still a good face, a kissable face as she leant across the table even if she got crumbs on her top because her brother was an animal who didn't clean up after himself. "Miss McAllister are you proposing."  
  
"I'm not _not_ proposing. But no. We're not done with school. And we've not lived together."  
  
"Good because I'd have said no for now. But provisional yes."  
  
"I've not blown it by taking you to see what else I do when I'm not helping out at the family pub and setting up for myself outside school?"  
  
"Oh no dead sexy that, your girlfriend guddling about with corpses."  
  
"Blair!" She reached across to slap his shoulder lightly, choking on a laugh, pretending to be horrified. "I do not _guddle_ about with corpses! You were there, you heard everything, you know what I do and that there are no corpses involved at all in any of it."  
  
"Oh so you wouldn't guddle about with my bones?"  
  
"I'd need written permission."  
  
Blair laughed over the rim of his mug, shoulders shaking. "We're going to have the worst wedding vows one day. Hypothetically."  
  
"I mean I'm having Euan as my chief bride's…person. Thing. As my twin I get to claim him. There's probably laws for my side that say I get him."  
  
"I'll fight you for Euan."  
  
"After tonight? With the state of this kitchen?"  
  
"He's my flatmate and my best pal, who'll be my best man?"  
  
"I don't make the rules."  
  
"You just did. Right there." With mock outrage, Blair set his mug down to better gesture at her so Shirley did the only thing that she could, leaning across the table to kiss him again, slower and deeper, fingers tangling in his hair. "Doesn't mean you win the war," Blair managed when they parted but his cheeks were flushed, his mouth trying to pull into a smile despite his efforts to stop it.  
  
"But I've won this battle, right?" She asked, tossing her hair over her shoulder, sitting up straight, every inch the conquering hero. Still, she hesitated before she asked the question she wanted to ask that she wouldn't have other nights. "Does that mean I get to stay the night to lord over what I've won?"  
  
"As if I'd send you home when it's lashing outside. And after tonight…I…I might have nightmares, I don't trust Euan's to be kind to me or to even come if he heard me thrashing about."  
  
"You're giving Euan too much credit: he wouldn't even hear you thrashing about in the first place."  
  
Blair sighed, all the breath escaping him slowly then finished his tea. "You want another one? Because I have questions and we've got a bit of time before Euan's back." He tried for coy, which didn't work, not really when he was still pale with his hair flattened, out of place, and now drying in a half-curled mess against his face but Shirley shook her head, handing over the mug that Blair dumped in the sink.  
  
The kitchen was Euan's job, he could deal with that whenever he got in with a sister to nag him in the morning if need be. Right now there was Blair laughing as they tripped through the flat into his tiny bedroom without an audience in attendance.  
  


* * *

  
  
Her phone read 2:18 when the front door opened and closed with exaggerated slowness of the drunkard attempting stealth, Blair starting awake where his face was pressed against her shoulder. She stroked her fingers through his dark hair, greasy with yesterday's product and the rain, shushing him as Euan bumbled about knocking into things, muttering to himself.  
  
He tripped at one point. Or it sounded like it from the thump and the groan. She listened for the span of several heartbeats until she heard his footsteps and no noises to indicate distress.   
  
She'd know if it was something worse. Of course she'd know.  
  
"Shirl?" Blair's voice was thick with sleep, his eyes barely open this time.  
  
"It's just Euan, I'm here, I'll keep you safe."  
  
"C'n you tell me that—" A huge yawn interrupted him, face pressed more firmly against her as Shirley tugged the covers up over them more. "That poem again."  
  
"You're a morbid bastard," she told him which had meant _I love you_ in her family for as long as she could remember. Blair settled against her, expectation hanging over him as she cleared her throat and closed her eyes again, voice a low whisper as sleep reached for her too. "What a plague is this o’ mine, winna steek his e’e, though I hap him ow’r the head as cosie as can be. Sleep! an’ let me to my wark, a’ thae claes to airn; Jenny wi’ the airn teeth, come an’ tak’ the bairn…"

**Author's Note:**

> Most of this is based on a lot of real stories that have come out of Glasgow (minus the dullahan but there are also no stories of banshees living in Glasgow in 2019 that I know of.) I can't recommend The Guide to Mysterious Glasgow enough but here's a bit more:
> 
> Title comes from the words on the gate of the Necropolis, *toties reduentes eodum*- so often returning to the same place which happens to be the trading motto of the Merchants' House.  
[Vampire in the Southern Necropolis](https://www.glasgowfamilyhistory.org.uk/blog/Pages/Vampire-in-the-Southern-Necropolis.aspx) because this was a thing that went down that I adapted for this story.  
[Jenny Wi' the Airn Teeth](http://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/poem/jenny-wi-airn-teeth/) the poem Shirley reads to Blair at the end  
[Glasgow Necropolis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasgow_Necropolis) and [more details and photos](https://www.glasgownecropolis.org)  
[Ramshorn Cemetary](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramshorn_Cemetery)  
[Southern Necropolis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Necropolis)  
[Glasgow resurrection men](https://www.electricscotland.com/history/glasgow/anec219.htm)
> 
> There are other theories/stories kicking about that I know and I've done in the reading so go read the book if you're interested you won't be disappointed!


End file.
